The Half Moon
by White Silver and Mercury
Summary: Sora would never admit it, maybe not for a while, if in a while they were still together, and could admit things they never thought they would, but—he really wasn't all that big of a music junkie. / RiSo drabble, fic prompt, grossly autobiographical because writers are so self-centered like that, I'm sorry


THE HALF MOON

**DISCLAIMER: **Still don't own the rights to KH.  
**prompt: **old school record store (originally posted on tumblr)

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Sora would never admit it, maybe not for a while, if in a while they were still together, and could admit things they never thought they would, but—he really wasn't all that big of a music junkie.

He had his favorite bands, anyway. And he bought anything they released, of course. And his roommate always rolled his eyes when another band poster went up in the bedroom, but it's not like his roommate really spent any time in there anyway. Just when he and Axel were fighting and the shouts echoed from the other side of the apartment. "I'm going to my room!" was apparently equivalent to "I'm sleeping on the couch!" and when those nights happened, Sora usually just put on his headphones and covered his face with his pillow so he could block out the desk light until his roommate either A) stormed back out to argue some more and eventually make up or B) tugged shyly on the pillow barrier looking for a friendly distraction.

Sora could not name every music revolution and/or movement since Elvis Presley. He hadn't really known or cared about the difference between an EP and an album until two weeks ago (when he'd pretended to have known all along, anyway). He had a Walkman in the desk drawer, and yes, he had destroyed a tape cassette or two in his lifetime out of pure curiosity. He really didn't understand what the big deal about Reading was and who cared about the differences between Bumbershoot, or Coachella, or Lollapalooza or Warped?

Saturday nights in a college town, there wasn't much going on unless you were at the right party or elbowed your way into a club downtown.

Neither of which, this Saturday, happened to be in Sora's stars.

He had to work.

Half Moon Records was tucked in the back corner of Dogwood and Pacific, somewhere a few alleys away from the bus depot, and just two streets down from the block of seedy "old downtown", with its crumbling brick and crooked fire escapes and the city center institutions that reeked of mold and cigarette smoke. The places elementary school field trips took you to try and instill a sense of community pride. "Look, here's City Hall. Here's the Courthouse. These apartments were once the first church in the city, a long time ago. Here's county jail." He and Roxas had had to go pick Axel up there once, at the county jail. It was sort of a creepy place. And there was no actual DMV in the city, so you had to go City Hall where every breath you took seemed a jungle of mildew spores.

Half Moon Records was right on the edge of the street all the kids called Hippie Headquarters, but all the art places and bakeries and incense shops with the smiling suns over their doors and the bead curtains in their windows closed somewhere between nine and ten, but that was fine because most everyone had migrated elsewhere by then. Bars and dorm parties and parks to be vandalized, and sometimes really even just back home for a shower and some television before bed.

A giant crescent moon with a too-big grin leered down at Sora over the glass doors of the joint. Band flyers and posters and street team stickers were quite the colorful mess across the front window, leaving little to no room to actually peek in and examine the collection inside of records and tapes and other vintage shit. A wind chime hung on the door and let loose an awful barrage of tinkling notes as Sora went in.

The place was deserted.

He felt so bad for the guy who got the closing shifts here, seeing as it was open until one in the morning.

It smelled like old. The droning of the vents almost swallowed the music drifting from speakers propped up above the shelves, hovering over all those who wandered through.

_Can you feel my love buzz? Can you feel my love buzz? _

One of those terrible creepy monkeys sat on the counter by the bulky register, grinning its lurid grin and staring with its beady eyes, rusty cymbals ready to crash. That thing was a nightmare creation, seriously. Like Furbies.

Sora twirled his car keys on one finger and stretched across the counter, trying to see down the back hall and into the Half Moon's employee office.

"Helloooo?" he called. "Food's here—"

Riku appeared suddenly in the hall. Or rather, half of him did, poking out of the office. And the instant he met Sora's eyes, that high and mighty scowl of his faded into his default half-smirk, and he sauntered down with a yawn and hoisted himself onto the stool behind the counter. He swayed to and fro first, smirking at Sora; then leaned down and folded his arms on the counter.

"Did you get me coffee, too?"

"With an extra shot."

"What'd you bring tonight?"

"I thought I'd surprise you. Hey, are you gonna tip me good, or what?"

"Man, I thought having a boyfriend who delivered Jimmy John's meant I _wouldn't_ have to pay so much for food."

Sora blushed. Good Christ, his face was on fire, actually. _Boyfriend_. How much longer would it be before it stopped feeling so new and terrifying to admit? When would he not have to endure the mutant butterflies multiplying in his stomach? _Boyfriend_.

"When is Saix gonna stop making you close?" Sora grumbled, dragging a stool over from one of the media racks to sit across the counter from Riku as he ate his dinner.

"Not sure." Riku shrugged.

There was a monitor hanging over the front counter, flashing fuzzy MTV music videos. The tapes had to be changed every half hour, but when Riku closed, he just hit rewind and let the videos loop.

God, Riku looked good.

Sora hoped he didn't realize he was staring so dumbly.

Riku was tired. Sora could tell. In his shoes, who wouldn't be, though? He was a full-time student, too. But he didn't have the luxury of working thirteen hours a week. He worked every damn night. He wrote all his papers and did his class projects in the back office. Which Sora told him over and over was not really healthy, but Riku was stubborn and quiet and that was a deadly duo.

There were bags beneath his quick green eyes. His pale hair was up in a sloppy ponytail. His tattered Henley was wrinkled at the collar. He'd probably been sleeping on his arms in the office. And he was so fucking fine, that long neck and the piercings in the ears, and the way his ripped jeans rode his hips—

He'd been wearing a sweater way too long for him when Sora had first seen him. A sweater that looked right off the racks of a thrift shop and whose sleeves had been shoved up to show off hemp and sex bracelets and a stupid mood ring and a tattoo of some word on the bony line of his wrist. His hair had been down, a silver mess in and out of his face. With a single tiny braid hanging down over the right ear, which had been Naminé's doing, that cute blonde girl who worked evenings with him. And he'd seen Sora busily reading the inside of _Incesticide_, and when Sora had put the album back with an uncertain pucker of the face, he'd said, "Not your thing? Are you more REM, then? Or maybe the Beastie Boys?" And Sora had been so startled because he hadn't noticed Riku come over at all, organizing shelves like the hard worker he was. So startled, in fact, that he'd staggered back and knocked over an entire Fleetwood Mac display and everyone had stared at him while he stood there stupidly and Riku had hurried to pick it all up.

"What a fucking dork!" Roxas had snorted all the way home that afternoon, reveling in Sora's misery. Which he did often, just like Sora reveled in his when it wasn't Axel-related. "'Oh, geez, sorry, I just knocked over all your hard work but let me just stand here and watch you pick it up and don't worry, I'm totally not checking out your ass!'"

Riku knew everything about music.

Sora had discovered this quite quickly, like the fact that Riku lived with his brother, and Riku was actually studying History, not Music or Communications, and Riku wanted to go to Burning Man, and Riku sometimes danced to the music in Half Moon without even realizing it, and Riku's favorite incense was Dragon's Blood from the zen shop two doors down, and Riku had a habit of cracking his knuckles with a single thumb like some people had a habit of biting their nails.

These little things about people you discovered pretty easy when you spent half your time in a record shop flirting with one of the workers, anyway.

Riku could name every music revolution and/or movement since Elvis Presley. He knew the difference between an EP and an album. He understood the big deal about Reading and he could point out all the subtle differences between Bumbershoot, Coachella, Lollapalooza, and Warped.

And Sora had always just nodded and agreed with everything, feeling a little bit like a fish with his mouth open and eyes wide, because he'd really wanted Riku to like him so he'd figured any signs of not knowing the music industry inside and out were absolute no-nos.

But every now and again, Sora remembered the way Riku had looked when he'd kissed him late on a Saturday night just before closing, after ordering from the sub place and requesting Sora as the driver, and Half Moon had been empty and _Like a Virgin_ had been playing on the fuzzy TV, and Riku had smiled so softly, and so faintly, and reached out to dust hair out of Sora's face like you were typically supposed to, like real dates really did, not party hookups, or casual fucks, or guys who liked to use you so they didn't have to admit to any preferences other than keggers and tits, and you know, thinking back on it now, Sora was pretty sure that in that moment as Riku had leaned forward and caught his mouth in his own, Riku had known that Sora did not know half as much as he did about music.

"Let me tip you," Riku grunted, thumbing the last few crumbs off the corner of his mouth and holding a hand out for Sora to come behind the counter.

Sora scurried around, expecting a sweet little kiss and maybe a teasing pat on the ass or something.

A kiss, sure. A sweet little kiss that turned into a deep tongue-down-the-throat real tonsil-hockey action kind of kiss, actually, and Sora sought out the counter to lean upon before the rest of him besides his knees melted to butterfly-riddled goo. Riku tasted a little bit like a sub sandwich but a lot more like strong coffee. Sora's knees shook. Riku's mouth was hot and open in the ticklish spot of his neck. Sora couldn't help it; he was a boy, Goddammit. Things stirred immediately to Riku's touch and he clapped a hand over his mouth out of pure reaction, feeling dirty in the best way. Ah! Wasn't it fun to be young and wild, and let your boyfriend put his hand down the front of your jeans behind the counter of the record store?

"Riku, Wakka will bitch at me if I take more than thirty minutes for a delivery—"

Riku chuckled. He offered a shrug in response.

And if there was anything Sora _did_ know about music, it was that it had a funny way of bringing people together sometimes.

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END.


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